Demystifying ecosystem services
Food chains in ecosystems exist in the form of food pyramids. Although a food chain might not always be a linear chain of progression and can alternatively be called a food web. However, according to certain defining characteristics, certain levels of production and consumption can be differentiated in a food chain. These are called trophic levels, which can be defined as the feeding levels in a food chain or web in an ecological community.
Trophic Levels
The rest of the food chain or web consists of consumers who consume other organic life-forms for their energy needs. The second trophic level is represented by primary consumers, who are organisms that consume primary producers for their food and energy needs. Herbivores can be classified as secondary producers, representing the second trophic level in an ecosystem.
The third broad category among the trophic levels in a food chain is secondary consumers, which are organisms that consume primary consumers such as carnivores such as snakes that eat primary consumers such as mice.
The fourth and the last trophic level is the last broad category of tertiary consumers, which are organisms that consume secondary consumers for their food and energy needs. An example that proceeds from the previous example is that of hawks, which can eat snakes, which in turn is a carnivore that preys on primary consumers.
The chain of consumption can keep progressing, however, these are the necessary categories of consumption that forms the substrate for an analysis of trophic levels at most ecosystems.
Having separated the various trophic levels, it cannot be said that there is always a clear separation between the various trophic levels in a given ecosystem. Many consumers can feed at multiple trophic levels. A prime example is humans themselves, who can be primary consumers while consuming plants, secondary consumers while consuming mutton and tertiary consumers while consuming salmon.
Also certain primary producers can also act as consumers as well. An example is insectivorous plants that photosynthesize and at the same time consume certain organisms such as insects as food. Thus instead of food chains in linear progression, most ecosystems form food webs in the literal sense consisting of dense networks of consumption and differentiation of roles forming ecological communities.
Going from one trophic level to a higher one in terms of consumption, it is found that just 10 per cent of the energy possessed at one level is available for consumption at the next level of consumption. The remainder of the energy is either utilized by the metabolism of organisms or is released to the environment as heat or waste (D. Wilkin & J. Brainard, 2015).
Thus one can observe a decrease in energy resources available the higher up the chain of consumption one travels in a food chain in a linear manner, resulting in a lower amount of species diversity at the specialized higher levels of food chains in an ecosystem. However, the incredible amount of species diversity at the lower levels of the food chain can add to the confusion over the adequate categorization and in proving a sense of structure to ecosystems.
Ecosystems almost always consist of food webs that are interlinked and differentiated, leading to great biodiversity and the resulting complexity.
Ecological Communities
Although food webs can exist in great biodiversity and complexity, they also represent hierarchies and organization of species in an ecosystem. Ecosystems can overlap and interact, and as such there is no distinct and definite characterization of ecosystems based on the spatial configurations of interactions.
However, ecosystems can be characterized by an in-situ fluid equilibrium existing among ecological communities of organisms of different species. The equilibrium in general is maintained in ecosystems although temporal heterogeneity can lead to the fluctuation of various variables within ecosystems.
Ecosystem processes result from the life-processes of the organisms in their interactions with each other as well as with the abiotic environment. These processes however generate ecosystem services that can provide useful utilities to humans. Studies of ecosystem services can bypass structural and behavioural studies of organisms at the various trophic levels of an ecosystem and go forward towards analyzing the transition of energy and matter through an ecosystem.
However both sets of activities and processes are not mutually exclusive and aspects can overlap in investigations. The interactions in the various trophic levels involve the transfer of energy and matter, but their analysis also utilizes documentary aspects of structure and behaviour in ecosystems.
Understanding ecosystem services
Various functions of ecosystems are provided to the environment as the result of the interaction of organisms in various trophic levels in food webs. Some of them include provision of nutrients, decomposition, nitrogen cycling, contributions to the hydrological cycle, soil functions, maintenance of biological equilibrium, etc. These in turn offer beneficial ecosystem services to humans such as food, medicinal applications, water purification, crop reproduction, and many more.
In fact, it can be safely said that a huge part of resource collection in human economic activity is dependant on ecosystem services in some part or another. As such, it becomes necessary to preserve the equilibrium of ecosystems by preserving the food webs that constitute the organization of various trophic levels in an ecosystem.
This would ensure that the transfer of energy and matter occurs undisturbed in the embedded structures and complex behavioural characteristics of organisms. For this an intimate understanding of ecological communities is necessary.
All ecological services are possible due to ecological communities of organisms interacting in consort to provide certain results that form part of the natural equilibrium that is a self-sustaining framework. These ecological communities are composed of interactions that are made up of ecological niches that constitute certain clearly appreciable roles that certain species perform in its interaction with its ecosystem, and act as the unit for analysis of the interactions that species have in constituting ecological communities.
The interactions in terms of ecological niches can be symbiotic or competitive. However, both can feature in food webs and trophic levels and exhibit an immense variety that contributes to the overall biodiversity.
This biodiversity, due to the food web and its arrangement according to various trophic levels, occurs as functional differentiation in a hierarchical mode of organization. However, the dense network of species interaction makes these hierarchies less visible, and instead what is usually observed are communities of interacting species.
Ecological niche
Source: thwink.org
All hierarchies are ordered according to certain values that serve to provide access to participants whose concomitant roles contribute to their sequential differentiation. In ecosystems the dominant values according to which hierarchies are differentiated is the food web, and trophic levels and ecological niches offer an easy tool with which to form genealogical associations of roles in ecological hierarchies.
Ecological niches thus offer a model according to which adjustments that organisms make to community living can be analyzed. While trophic levels can provide a basis for an triggering mechanism for roles to be hierarchically ordered, the finer aspects of the ecological roles of species are defined by the ecological niches they occupy.
These roles in turn shape ecosystem services and offer principles to better understand the formative processes and the complex web of interactions that constitute the structures, behaviours and relationships that constitute ecological communities.
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Petrol in India is cheaper than in countries like Hong Kong, Germany and the UK but costlier than in China, Brazil, Japan, the US, Russia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, a Bank of Baroda Economics Research report showed.
Rising fuel prices in India have led to considerable debate on which government, state or central, should be lowering their taxes to keep prices under control.
The rise in fuel prices is mainly due to the global price of crude oil (raw material for making petrol and diesel) going up. Further, a stronger dollar has added to the cost of crude oil.
Amongst comparable countries (per capita wise), prices in India are higher than those in Vietnam, Kenya, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Venezuela. Countries that are major oil producers have much lower prices.
In the report, the Philippines has a comparable petrol price but has a per capita income higher than India by over 50 per cent.
Countries which have a lower per capita income like Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Venezuela have much lower prices of petrol and hence are impacted less than India.
“Therefore there is still a strong case for the government to consider lowering the taxes on fuel to protect the interest of the people,” the report argued.
India is the world’s third-biggest oil consuming and importing nation. It imports 85 per cent of its oil needs and so prices retail fuel at import parity rates.
With the global surge in energy prices, the cost of producing petrol, diesel and other petroleum products also went up for oil companies in India.
They raised petrol and diesel prices by Rs 10 a litre in just over a fortnight beginning March 22 but hit a pause button soon after as the move faced criticism and the opposition parties asked the government to cut taxes instead.
India imports most of its oil from a group of countries called the ‘OPEC +’ (i.e, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Russia, etc), which produces 40% of the world’s crude oil.
As they have the power to dictate fuel supply and prices, their decision of limiting the global supply reduces supply in India, thus raising prices
The government charges about 167% tax (excise) on petrol and 129% on diesel as compared to US (20%), UK (62%), Italy and Germany (65%).
The abominable excise duty is 2/3rd of the cost, and the base price, dealer commission and freight form the rest.
Here is an approximate break-up (in Rs):
a)Base Price | 39 |
b)Freight | 0.34 |
c) Price Charged to Dealers = (a+b) | 39.34 |
d) Excise Duty | 40.17 |
e) Dealer Commission | 4.68 |
f) VAT | 25.35 |
g) Retail Selling Price | 109.54 |
Looked closely, much of the cost of petrol and diesel is due to higher tax rate by govt, specifically excise duty.
So the question is why government is not reducing the prices ?
India, being a developing country, it does require gigantic amount of funding for its infrastructure projects as well as welfare schemes.
However, we as a society is yet to be tax-compliant. Many people evade the direct tax and that’s the reason why govt’s hands are tied. Govt. needs the money to fund various programs and at the same time it is not generating enough revenue from direct taxes.
That’s the reason why, govt is bumping up its revenue through higher indirect taxes such as GST or excise duty as in the case of petrol and diesel.
Direct taxes are progressive as it taxes according to an individuals’ income however indirect tax such as excise duty or GST are regressive in the sense that the poorest of the poor and richest of the rich have to pay the same amount.
Does not matter, if you are an auto-driver or owner of a Mercedes, end of the day both pay the same price for petrol/diesel-that’s why it is regressive in nature.
But unlike direct tax where tax evasion is rampant, indirect tax can not be evaded due to their very nature and as long as huge no of Indians keep evading direct taxes, indirect tax such as excise duty will be difficult for the govt to reduce, because it may reduce the revenue and hamper may programs of the govt.
Globally, around 80% of wastewater flows back into the ecosystem without being treated or reused, according to the United Nations.
This can pose a significant environmental and health threat.
In the absence of cost-effective, sustainable, disruptive water management solutions, about 70% of sewage is discharged untreated into India’s water bodies.
A staggering 21% of diseases are caused by contaminated water in India, according to the World Bank, and one in five children die before their fifth birthday because of poor sanitation and hygiene conditions, according to Startup India.
As we confront these public health challenges emerging out of environmental concerns, expanding the scope of public health/environmental engineering science becomes pivotal.
For India to achieve its sustainable development goals of clean water and sanitation and to address the growing demands for water consumption and preservation of both surface water bodies and groundwater resources, it is essential to find and implement innovative ways of treating wastewater.
It is in this context why the specialised cadre of public health engineers, also known as sanitation engineers or environmental engineers, is best suited to provide the growing urban and rural water supply and to manage solid waste and wastewater.
Traditionally, engineering and public health have been understood as different fields.
Currently in India, civil engineering incorporates a course or two on environmental engineering for students to learn about wastewater management as a part of their pre-service and in-service training.
Most often, civil engineers do not have adequate skills to address public health problems. And public health professionals do not have adequate engineering skills.
India aims to supply 55 litres of water per person per day by 2024 under its Jal Jeevan Mission to install functional household tap connections.
The goal of reaching every rural household with functional tap water can be achieved in a sustainable and resilient manner only if the cadre of public health engineers is expanded and strengthened.
In India, public health engineering is executed by the Public Works Department or by health officials.
This differs from international trends. To manage a wastewater treatment plant in Europe, for example, a candidate must specialise in wastewater engineering.
Furthermore, public health engineering should be developed as an interdisciplinary field. Engineers can significantly contribute to public health in defining what is possible, identifying limitations, and shaping workable solutions with a problem-solving approach.
Similarly, public health professionals can contribute to engineering through well-researched understanding of health issues, measured risks and how course correction can be initiated.
Once both meet, a public health engineer can identify a health risk, work on developing concrete solutions such as new health and safety practices or specialised equipment, in order to correct the safety concern..
There is no doubt that the majority of diseases are water-related, transmitted through consumption of contaminated water, vectors breeding in stagnated water, or lack of adequate quantity of good quality water for proper personal hygiene.
Diseases cannot be contained unless we provide good quality and adequate quantity of water. Most of the world’s diseases can be prevented by considering this.
Training our young minds towards creating sustainable water management systems would be the first step.
Currently, institutions like the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M) are considering initiating public health engineering as a separate discipline.
To leverage this opportunity even further, India needs to scale up in the same direction.
Consider this hypothetical situation: Rajalakshmi, from a remote Karnataka village spots a business opportunity.
She knows that flowers, discarded in the thousands by temples can be handcrafted into incense sticks.
She wants to find a market for the product and hopefully, employ some people to help her. Soon enough though, she discovers that starting a business is a herculean task for a person like her.
There is a laborious process of rules and regulations to go through, bribes to pay on the way and no actual means to transport her product to its market.
After making her first batch of agarbathis and taking it to Bengaluru by bus, she decides the venture is not easy and gives up.
On the flipside of this is a young entrepreneur in Bengaluru. Let’s call him Deepak. He wants to start an internet-based business selling sustainably made agarbathis.
He has no trouble getting investors and to mobilise supply chains. His paperwork is over in a matter of days and his business is set up quickly and ready to grow.
Never mind that the business is built on aggregation of small sellers who will not see half the profit .
Is this scenario really all that hypothetical or emblematic of how we think about entrepreneurship in India?
Between our national obsession with unicorns on one side and glorifying the person running a pakora stall for survival as an example of viable entrepreneurship on the other, is the middle ground in entrepreneurship—a space that should have seen millions of thriving small and medium businesses, but remains so sparsely occupied that you could almost miss it.
If we are to achieve meaningful economic growth in our country, we need to incorporate, in our national conversation on entrepreneurship, ways of addressing the missing middle.
Spread out across India’s small towns and cities, this is a class of entrepreneurs that have been hit by a triple wave over the last five years, buffeted first by the inadvertent fallout of demonetization, being unprepared for GST, and then by the endless pain of the covid-19 pandemic.
As we finally appear to be reaching some level of normality, now is the opportune time to identify the kind of industries that make up this layer, the opportunities they should be afforded, and the best ways to scale up their functioning in the shortest time frame.
But, why pay so much attention to these industries when we should be celebrating, as we do, our booming startup space?
It is indeed true that India has the third largest number of unicorns in the world now, adding 42 in 2021 alone. Braving all the disruptions of the pandemic, it was a year in which Indian startups raised $24.1 billion in equity investments, according to a NASSCOM-Zinnov report last year.
However, this is a story of lopsided growth.
The cities of Bengaluru, Delhi/NCR, and Mumbai together claim three-fourths of these startup deals while emerging hubs like Ahmedabad, Coimbatore, and Jaipur account for the rest.
This leap in the startup space has created 6.6 lakh direct jobs and a few million indirect jobs. Is that good enough for a country that sends 12 million fresh graduates to its workforce every year?
It doesn’t even make a dent on arguably our biggest unemployment in recent history—in April 2020 when the country shutdown to battle covid-19.
Technology-intensive start-ups are constrained in their ability to create jobs—and hybrid work models and artificial intelligence (AI) have further accelerated unemployment.
What we need to focus on, therefore, is the labour-intensive micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME). Here, we begin to get to a definitional notion of what we called the mundane middle and the problems it currently faces.
India has an estimated 63 million enterprises. But, out of 100 companies, 95 are micro enterprises—employing less than five people, four are small to medium and barely one is large.
The questions to ask are: why are Indian MSMEs failing to grow from micro to small and medium and then be spurred on to make the leap into large companies?
At the Global Alliance for Mass Entrepreneurship (GAME), we have advocated for a National Mission for Mass Entrepreneurship, the need for which is more pronounced now than ever before.
Whenever India has worked to achieve a significant economic milestone in a limited span of time, it has worked best in mission mode. Think of the Green Revolution or Operation Flood.
From across various states, there are enough examples of approaches that work to catalyse mass entrepreneurship.
The introduction of entrepreneurship mindset curriculum (EMC) in schools through alliance mode of working by a number of agencies has shown significant improvement in academic and life outcomes.
Through creative teaching methods, students are encouraged to inculcate 21st century skills like creativity, problem solving, critical thinking and leadership which are not only foundational for entrepreneurship but essential to thrive in our complex world.
Udhyam Learning Foundation has been involved with the Government of Delhi since 2018 to help young people across over 1,000 schools to develop an entrepreneurial mindset.
One pilot programme introduced the concept of ‘seed money’ and saw 41 students turn their ideas into profit-making ventures. Other programmes teach qualities like grit and resourcefulness.
If you think these are isolated examples, consider some larger data trends.
The Observer Research Foundation and The World Economic Forum released the Young India and Work: A Survey of Youth Aspirations in 2018.
When asked which type of work arrangement they prefer, 49% of the youth surveyed said they prefer a job in the public sector.
However, 38% selected self-employment as an entrepreneur as their ideal type of job. The spirit of entrepreneurship is latent and waiting to be unleashed.
The same can be said for building networks of successful women entrepreneurs—so crucial when the participation of women in the Indian economy has declined to an abysmal 20%.
The majority of India’s 63 million firms are informal —fewer than 20% are registered for GST.
Research shows that companies that start out as formal enterprises become two-three times more productive than a similar informal business.
So why do firms prefer to be informal? In most cases, it’s because of the sheer cost and difficulty of complying with the different regulations.
We have academia and non-profits working as ecosystem enablers providing insights and evidence-based models for growth. We have large private corporations and philanthropic and funding agencies ready to invest.
It should be in the scope of a National Mass Entrepreneurship Mission to bring all of them together to work in mission mode so that the gap between thought leadership and action can finally be bridged.